Sunday, October 7, 2012

A History of Vengeance and Assassination in Secret Societies

by: Tim O'NeillThat
secret societies exist is a historical and anthropological fact. The
difficulty is in obtaining valid, objective information on even the more
public groups, such as the Freemasons. Conspiracy hunters busily amass
piles of suggestive data to lend weight to charges of subversion and
nefarious vengeance, but these often Byzantine plots are built upon
shaky documentation and pure inference that could only convince other
conspiracy buffs involved in a closed world of newspaper clippings,
faulty syllogisms and talk-show emotionalism.The
conspiracy theorists tend to cluster in several different schools.
Heresy hunters along religious lines are detailed in my "The Christian
Theory of Occult Conspiracy" in Apocalypse Culture, first edition 1987. A
large secular school centers around Gary Allen's Bircherite None Dare Call It Conspiracy,
which lays out a globe-spanning cabal of bankers and commies, involving
such groups as the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderbergers and the
Rockefellers. This school, parodies by Robert Anton Wilson in his
Illuminati series, holds relatively little interest in the more
occultly-inclined secret societies.The best known school of conspiratology derives from John Robison’s 1798 tome Proofs of a Conspiracy. This
work is the root source of most the occult/political conspiracy
theories, which attempt to implicate Masons, Rosicrucians, Templars, and
Illuminati in the sinister attempt to destroy Western civilization in
favor of a Gnostic-Theocratic “One World” rule. In Gnosticism, the major
competitor with Christianity during the 2nd to 4th centuries of the
Roman Empire, all living beings are perceived as “monads” … pure points
of light and consciousness that exist beyond time and space. The
Constitution of the United States was a Gnostic effort to participate in
the upheaval against aging European political regimes and reshape the
American order along Masonic/Illuminatist lines. The “all mean are
created equal” clause of the Constitution was not to be taken literally,
but spiritually - a “monadal” understanding of human consciousness.Gnostic/occult
political upheavals of the past few centuries is rooted in Continental
Grand Orient Freemasonry (in contrast to the staunchly conservative
British and American Freemasonry). Its Strict Observance and
Templar-revival form are focal points for the vengeful tradition of
Freemasonry. The Bavarian Illuminati, under the leadership of Adam
Weishaupt, joined in this revolutionary fervor, attempting to translate
metaphysical into political realities. Occultist Universalism,
Anti-Imperialism, Libertarianism, Secularism and Anti-Clericalism all
find their roots in these forms of secret societies.It’s
no surprise that Karl Marx was a member of the Illuminati “League of
Just Men” prior to enunciating his economic and political theories. The
course of French, Italian and Sicilian Grand Orient Masonry during the
period of the great European revolutions, from 1789 to 1848,
demonstrates a gnosticizing tendency that we can only term as
“antinomian” - a desire to replace centralized and absolutist Christian
Monarchies with the principle of individual determination within the
universal Theocracy, or rule of the Divine Principle, the rise of the
power of the Monad over that of the Pope of King.In Proofs of Conspiracy,
Robison lays out his belief that the Bavarian Illuminati had
infiltrated Continental Freemasonry with the express intent of fomenting
revolution and rebellion against the Church and State. The truth of his
accusations are mitigated by the fact that social forces were ripe for
change. Even before the Gnostic program was underway, the Jesuit Order
was formed to police those who were using the Reformation as a cover
against the Christian power structure. In forming the Jesuit order, the
Papacy conceded that conservative Christianity could resort to
mind-manipulation, secrecy, intrigue, and assassination as well as any
other group. As the Jesuits circulated through the royal courts of
Europe and designed their schools for the indoctrination of children,
the Gnostics were moving on different levels. Speculative Freemasonry
and the British Royal Society were both founded in the early 18th
century to claim its roots to antiquity and to create a rational,
secular, scientific culture as far removed from Christian dogmas as was
practicable at the time.The
famous discovery of papers detailing Weishaupt’s program for the
Bavarian Illuminati, back in the 18th century, and Captain William
Morgan’s murder fanned the flames of anti-Masonic hysteria during the
mid-1800s. (It was assumed the Masons had kidnapped and murdered Morgan
because he threatened to publish Masonic secrets.) The stunning onset of
the Bolshevik revolution unleashed another flare of anti-Masonism and
anti-Jewish sentiments.The
modern post-Robison school of conspiratology was founded by British
writers Nesta Webster, Lady Queensborough and “Inquire Within.” in the
1920s and 1930s, lately followed by Christian-oriented conspiratologists
Salem Kirban, Robert Keith Spenser, Gerald B. Winrod, Constance Cumbey
and Tim LaHaye.A
close study of secret societies will reveal that a majority were formed
for reasons of self-protection, a means of insulating those who
subscribed to unorthodox religious, sexual and even artistic attitudes.
Robison was on the money, though, in his remarks about some secret
societies having been formed on both political and subversive platforms.
The Bavarian Illuminati and the National Socialist Party are two
familiar examples of groups who began life with an essentially mystical
outlook, and who later chose to put those insights into Realpolitik.
Such groups should be distinguished from those whose entire purpose was
political, nationalist or subversive, such as the Italian Carbonari, or
“charcoal burners.” The mystical-political or pure political groups
should be carefully distinguished from purely mystical or magical groups
as the Illuminati of Avignon or the Martinists, whose focus and means
remained otherworldly. Such groups tend to “render unto Caesar” while
following personal mystical beliefs in the course of daily life.Among
those secret societies whose aims are political, there is an
astonishing history of vengeance, assassination, mind-control, terrorism
and Machiavellianism of the most profound sort. The Hashashins, who
dominated through terrorism, added the word “assassin” to our
vocabulary.The
7th century split in the world of Islam, a fight between the “orthodox”
Sunnis and the “heterodox” Shiites, created a global blood feud. The
minority Shiites, fearing violent reprisals from the majority, hit upon
the solution to the undermining of their opponents through a system of
strict secrecy and devious accumulation of political and spiritual
influence. The famous “Lodge of Cairo” or “Abode of Wisdom” functioned
outwardly as a university, but really served as a cover for Shiite
political interests. Students at the “university” were gradually led
through nine initiatory levels of teaching, ranging from orthodoxy to
extreme radicalism. It is interesting to note that this system of
nine-degree gradualism is still preserved in many Masonic and
Rosicrucian groups in the United States and Europe, although a few
preserve the radicalism of the original teaching. Alternating confusion
and reassurance was the mind-manipulating technique of the Abode of
Wisdom, and such techniques echo modern mind-manipulation controls.The
Lodge of Cairo System initiated a large body of Shiite fanatics by the
mid 11th century, and they infiltrated throughout the heart of Sunni
Islam, the Caliphate of Baghdad. The Lodge controlled the Caliphate
until the expansion of the Turkish Dynasties brought about an end to the
power of the Cairo System through sheer force of the arms. In 1123 the
University closed, but its lessons were taken to heat by a radical Islam
Shiite by the name of Hassan-I-Sabbah. Following a bitter personal and
political failure, he wandered toward the mountains of Persia and
eventually reached Alamout, an impregnable mountain fortress, Within the
stronghold, he began the huge task of slowly subverting and
manipulating his way into a position of ultimate power within the ranks
of Islam, and even beyond the seas.Hassan
began his work by taking young men from the surrounding countryside and
indelibly impressing their minds with a surprisingly simple method of
mind control. He would feed the young and impressionable peasants
copious amounts of hashish and had them led blindfolded into a garden he
had constructed in a remote and well-guarded ravine at the foot of the
mountain Alamout. When their blindfolds were removed, the drugged
peasants were confronted with an intoxicating vision of running brooks,
exotic plants and animals, and shapely houris,
or dancing girls. Hassan himself then announced to the initiate that
this was the paradise promised in the Qur'an if the initiate would follow
him unto death, Some modern historians have begun to cast doubt upon
the actual existence of the fabled “garden” of Hassan, yet the
traditional account may just as well serve as a metaphor for his real
use of Hashish and the nine-degree gradualism of the Lodge of Cairo to
initiate recruits into his service.Hassan’s
strategic masterstroke was to plant his followers in positions of trust
at royal courts around the Mediterranean, Middle East and Europe. At
the least expected moment, often years after being planted, royalty
would be murdered in a knife attack, followed by revelation of Hassan’s
power and the suicide of the assassin. Hassan soon had many of the
world’s monarchs reduced to a state of constant paranoia. It wasn’t
until the 13th century and the military might of Mongol invaders that
the secret Assassin network came to ruin.Historians
have speculated that the Assassins and the Knights Templar entered into
several shady political, economic and “cultural” exchanges that helped
import the Lodge of Cairo system into the West, where it became grafted
into many of the indigenous secret societies and mystery-guilds. The
morphological similarity between Rosicrucianism (which was supposed to
have been imported to the West from Arabia), Speculative Freemasonry,
Illuminism, and all of the other societies who trace their lineages back
to the Templars, is striking. It should also be remembered that
Hassan’s system also functioned as a means of spiritual initiation into
the mystical experience of Sufism. Much like the current dynasty of
Iran, Hassan hoped to create a Sufic Theocracy with himself or the
chief Imam.The 13th century European society, Vehmgericht,
or “Holy Vehm” of Westphalia, were almost certainly influenced by
Hassan’s Assassins. The word “Vehm” is thought to be derived from the
Arabic word Fehm,
or “Wise.” “Wise” illuminized mystics have applied their Gnosis to the
lawless conditions of middle Europe during the 13th Century in quite an
extraordinary manner.Once
having decided that a criminal had broached one of its “Christian” laws
(the Vehm had its own peculiar system of jurisprudence), all the male
inhabitants of the victim’s village would be summoned together upon an
open hearth. Not to attend this meeting was itself punishable by death.
The judges and executioners were hooded, and the accused had no
opportunity to defend themselves, but to simply listen to the verdict.
The most minor of infractions was punishable by breaking of the legs.
Those accused of capital crimes had the choice of dying slowly in a
torture chamber (the Behm invented the notorious spiked casket), or
could elect to be declared Vogelfrie
(literally “free as a bird”). The latter method had the accused given a
head start at freedom, but could be hunted down like a dog by a member
of the Vehm. Very few ever escaped the huge network of Vehm influence,
and many simply turned themselves to escape the terror. The Vehm were so
powerful by the 15th century that they could order the Holy Roman
Emperor to appear as a common criminal in one of their courts. The Vehm
was rumored to exist as late as the 19th century, and reputedly provided
a historical mode for the S.S. “Werewolves”.The
hypothetical Assassin-Templar link is often laid at the root of modern
Scottish Rite Freemasonry. Having reached a position of great financial,
political and spiritual influence throughout Europe, he Templars
naturally became a target for the Pope and Emperor alike, The sudden
repression of the Templars by agents of Philip the Fair, took Europe by
surprise. Imprisoned, and awaiting death at the stake, Jacques DeMolay,
Grand Master of the Knights Templar, was supposed to have founded four
secret lodges at the outskirts of Europe, away from the influence of
Church and State. One of the lodges was supposedly formed at Edinburgh,
hence the term “Scottish Rite.” The purpose of these lodges was to carry
out the vengeance of the Templars against the Bourbon monarchy and the
Papacy. According to late Masonic doctrine, the Templars believed in the
ascendancy of liberty, equality and fraternity, as preached on secret
for a universal, illuminated theocracy on the model of Plato’s Republic.
The Assassin edge of Templarist beliefs comes into play with the famous
anecdote of the beheading of the Bourbon Monarch, Louis XVI, during the
French Revolution. Supposedly, someone in the crowd surrounding the
guillotine shouted, “Thou art avenged, Jacques DeMolay!” just as the
blade fell against the king’s neck.Eighteenth
century Freemasons certainly took the Templar legend to heart. Several
of the Scottish Rite degrees are directed toward creating historical
links with earlier groups such as the Rosicrucians and the Templars. The
Templar degrees are grouped together as “Black Lodge,” Encampment,” and
tellingly, the “Lodge of Vengeance.” In a ritual which includes the
symbolic stabbing of two skulls representing the Bourbon monarchy and
the Papacy, the initiate is led through a history of vengeance
stretching back to the Middle Ages The initiations are conducted in
rooms draped in black velvet and, unlike other Scottish Rite degrees,
black gloves replace the customary white. The grades of the dagger,
known as the Elect of Fifteen, the Master Elect of Nine (shades of the
Lodge of Cairo?), the Chevalier Effect, and the Chevalier Kadosh, are
all represented with black drapings and the presence of the assassin’s
dagger. Grand Orient Masonry in France and Italy, which operates its own
version of the Scottish Rite, is openly atheistic, anti-Christian and
tends toward both extremes of the political spectrum. The current drama
of the “Propaganda Due” Masonic Lodge, and its infiltration into the
Italian government, the Vatican, and even the mafia, demonstrates that
the radical Masonry of the French Revolution and the Carbonari is still
very much alive. It is widely believed that such radical lodges are the
source capital for many of the terrorist groups that haunt Europe. In
this light, the inception of modern assassination techniques can be seen
as a legacy brought into Europe as early as the Middle Ages, inherited
from the Hashashin system.It is now clear that at least one elite unit within the S.S. (Schutzstaffel,
or the “protective echelon,” Hitler’s personal bodyguard unit and
special police) was highly influenced by the Vehm tradition. When it
became clear to the higher officers of the S.S. at the end of WWII that
Germany was going to have fight a guerrilla war in order to survive, a
tightly knit group of expert assassins was organized to take out key
Allied personnel This was the famous Unternehmung Werwolf,
which was directly and self-consciously modeled upon the Vehmgericht in
order to add the older luster of terror to its already formidable
strength. It turned out that the Werewolves could only accomplish one
major assassination before the end of the war, that of the Mayor of
occupied Aachen. Still, the allure of their name and legend wa such that
Allied High Command was misled into assuming that the Bavarian Alps
were swarming with thousands of guerrilla fighters and assassins, an
assumption which materially affected Allied strategy at the time.The
history of modern terrorism, intelligence and counter-insurgency has
been deeply influenced by this long and complex history of vengeance and
assassination, which reaches back to a single disaffected Ismaili
Shiite with the intelligence and cunning to plan a means to terrorize,
control and dominate the entire world... Hassan-I-Sabbah!